'Cross Town Traffic'

Day 21

 

Chigwell - Chiswick Park

 

Another relatively short post, although the journey is anything but...

 

Today I cross from one side of London to the other and back, along pretty much the whole length of the Central Line.

 

Initially I had hoped to take in three stations today, but to add yet another trip up to the Chilterns to visit Chorleywood, on top of a visit to Essex and back for Chigwell, as well as fitting in Chiswick along the way, would be too much even for this intrepid traveller...

 

***

So it's off to Chigwell bright and early this morning (well, early for me, which in reality is about 9.30am).

 

I have high hopes of the place, as Charles Dickens (who, let's face it, has pretty much beaten me to every place I've been so far) once wrote of it: "Chigwell, my dear fellow, is the greatest place in the world!" - and he knew a thing or two about London's good and bad bits...

 

It takes me well over an hour to get there - though I don't particularly mind the journey. There's something strangely pleasurable about travelling the whole length (or as near as damn it) of a tube line. You start off with an empty tube, which gradually fills up as you head into the centre of town, and then, just as it's full to bursting (and you're grateful you got on at a terminus, as it means you got a seat right at the beginning) you begin to head out the other side and the train gradually empties again, leaving you as practically the only passenger to get off at the other end.

 

It's something the average commuter never sees - which is a pity.

 

***

There isn't, I'm afraid to say, much to see as I emerge from the station: a small parade of shops (including at least two or three beauty parlours) to my right, and that's about it other than a lot of (admittedly quite grand-looking) houses in either direction.

Chigwell - the greatest place in the world apparently

I'm not really getting the 'greatest place in the world' vibe, it must be said. Perhaps it's having a bit of an off-day.

 

The main fact about Chigwell that I've discovered in my pre-travel research, is that it's home to several current and former professional footballers and presumably therefore (a fact borne out perhaps by the number of beauty parlours) their wives and girlfriends as well.

 

Known in the 'trade' as WAGs, these women have always, it seems to me, been landed with rather an inaccurate moniker - or at least, one that can only ever be used in the plural.

 

A group of two or more 'significant others' (footballing or otherwise) could be a mixture of both Wives And Girlfriends, yes - but one woman must technically be either one or the other, surely? It's like the difference between 'mice' and 'mouse' - you can't have just one 'mice', any more than you can have several 'mouses'.

 

Now, I realise that the more grammatically correct singular term for a footballer's other half, which of course should be 'Wife Or Girlfriend', can't really be abbreviated in the same way as its plural, without causing offence to all sorts of people, so I propose that a new acronym be devised, and am happy to offer my own suggestion of a catch-all epithet here (purely to get the ball rolling you understand):

 

Significant Other And Partner, Yet Totally Independent Talented Woman (Assuming No Knickers)

 

Nothing to take offence at there, I hope...?

 

***

The accumulated wealth of several footballers, one or two TV celebrities, and a certain Lord Sugar, have created a sort of Essex Beverly Hills. Every other car is a top-end Mercedes (normally with the roof down) and every other house is surrounded by high walls and imposing looking iron gates, with the name of a security firm prominently displayed to warn off potential snoopers.

 

Perhaps the term WAG should actually be applied to the houses - Walled And Gated.

A few WAGs

Chigwell forms one corner of the so-called 'Golden Triangle' (with Loughton and Buckhurst Hill forming the other two). The name, according to one local, apparently has its origins in the belief that 'more properties change hands for cash around here than anywhere else in London', although it could equally refer to the preponderance of fake tan about the place.

 

Our old friend Dickens used one of the pubs here, 'Ye Olde King's Head', as the basis for The Maypole pub in Barnaby Rudge. Sadly the pub is no longer a pub, and has instead been somewhat mystifyingly converted into a Turkish restaurant called 'Sheesh', by none other than the aforementioned Alan Sugar. It's a fair old trek from the station to 'Sheesh', and about halfway there I decide I'm really not that interested in seeing what Lord Sugar has done to the place. It certainly won't have anything Dickensian about it, that's for sure.

 

So, I wander up and down for half an hour, but when you've seen one £3.5 million house complete with collection of various Mercs, you've seen them all. And besides, leg waxes and hair-straightening really aren't my glass of Chardonnay...

 

***

Chiswick Park Station is nowhere near Chiswick Park, for the very good reason that there is no such place.

Chiswick Park

 

There may have been, once upon a time, but if so I can find no reference to it. There is a Chiswick Common, but that's further east nearer to Turnham Green Station. Turnham Green itself is of course actually nearer Chiswick Park Station than it is to Turnham Green Station, but the bit of grass that is closest of all to Chiswick Park Station is... Acton Green Common (so green they named it twice?)

 

Go figure.

 

There is now a business park, which calls itself Chiswick Park, and in time no doubt everyone will assume that's where the station got its name - that's how history works after all...

 

***

Whereas Chigwell gave off a not entirely pleasant whiff of perma-tanned wealth, Chiswick Park (or more accurately Chiswick in general) has an air of quietly sophisticated affluence.

 

There are just as many Mercedes cars, and probably an equal number of beauty parlours, but somehow it's all done with a little more class.

 

Living in Ealing, not too far away, I already know Chiswick reasonably well, and have often come here to wander up and down the High Road. It's one of those places - like Islington - where I could happily while away an afternoon perambulating or popping into shops, or sitting with a coffee and people-watching.

 

And in fact, that's just what I do today. Leaving the station behind me (and I'm sure I didn't need to tell you whose hand sketched out the now-familiar drum-shaped entrance hall) I walk south to Chiswick High Road, and then east as far as Turnham Green Terrace. I don't want to overlap with a future visit there, so I double back along the other side of the road, wandering through the grassy open space of Turnham Green, which is currently filled with lunching Chiswickians.

 

Back at the station, and a little further along from it, I find the Gunnersbury Triangle Nature Reserve.

 

Gunnersbury Triangle
Nature Reserve

This is the third such nature reserve I've encountered on my travels (there was one at Arsenal, which I didn't explore, and another at Canning Town which I did) and all three have been slap bang next to busy railway lines - surely the last place you'd expect nature to seek refuge.

 

However, it seems that a regular dose of rattling tube train cacophony is just the tonic for the various flora and fauna to be found (so I'm informed) within the confines of this triangle of greenery.

 

 

 

Slim Shady...?

In fact, much like my experience at the Bow Creek Ecology Park in Canning Town, it's very pleasant and peaceful and the trees are green and lush, but I don't see much evidence of the Woodpeckers, Butterflies or other creatures supposedly frolicking unconcernedly in the undergrowth...

 

 

 

 

 

Nature being reserved...

Nevertheless, it's a relaxing way to while away a half hour or so, and I head back to the station with a few photos, and a feeling of calm, which lasts at least twenty seconds into the tube journey home...